


Five Times Mrs Hudson Faked Her Tears and One Time She Didn’t

by greenteams



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: 5+1 Things, Anniversary, Canon Compliant, Chronological, Developing Relationship, Friends to Lovers, Happy Ending, Johnlock - Freeform, Johnlock Roulette, M/M, POV Mrs. Hudson
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-26
Updated: 2017-02-26
Packaged: 2018-09-27 02:15:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,680
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9945779
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/greenteams/pseuds/greenteams
Summary: In her legendary life, Martha L. Hudson had faked crying for various reasons. Yet one day her tears were more real than anything.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I am not a native speaker. I am a Johnlocker from China, and I wrote this fic on January 29th, 2017 to celebrate the anniversary of the date when the detective met his doctor. Originally it is written in Chinese, then I decided to translate it into English, in order to share it with more of you. Pardon me for any grammatical error or inaccuracies, and you are more than welcome to correct me!  
> This is a 5+1 thing, and I hope you enjoy it.

**Dedicated to our beloved Mrs Hudson, who is the absolute leader of Team Johnlock!**

01  
Summer, 1966

_So when he was actually arrested for blowing someone’s head off, it was quite a relief, to be honest._

The young woman curled up in the hard wooden chair of the interrogation room, with her tiny and slim figure trembling from head to toe. She buried her face deep in her hands and wept, tears coming down through fingers. Her delicate and lovingly pathetic form would made anyone’s heart ache for her.

“Ma’am...We’ve still got several questions to ask here, do you mind stopping crying for a moment?” The Officer sitting at the opposite side of the desk is a robust tall black man, who seemed a little at a loss facing the situation.

Said Ma’am just buried her face deeper and cried harder.

The officer went through some pages of the files. “Er...Martha, right? May I call you Martha?”

Martha put her hands down. The rims of her eyes puffed from all the crying, her makeup was a mess. Still, her face was quite attractive. She nodded to the officer, in a lovable and heart-wrenching way, and started talking while sobbing intermittently.

“I swear I know nothing, Mr. Officer! I married Frank two years ago, and we moved to Florida a couple of months afterwards. We have a house at the beach. He tells me he’s running a Cartel, dealing with some imports and exports of medical materials. How would I comprehend anything about the business! I buy every word he told me without the slightest doubt. I stay at home for most time, and I also teach kids to dance and make cookies at kindergarten.”

The officer scratched his head, feeling awkward. This is clearly an innocent naive harmless young woman, who would believed her to be the wife of Frank Hudson, No. 1 drug dealer on Florida P.D.’s wanted list?

“But according to the records here...You have been in charge of the account management?”

“I was just typing, Sir! Frank’s manuscripts are quite ambiguous, I’ve always thought those acronyms are product types...Oh I’ve been so so so stupid not to find out that he’s been dealing with drugs! Of course I was sort of aware of all the other women, yet I thought that’s all it was. That explains why he’s not at home quite often, and the constant uncertainty of his whereabouts... I think I just love Frank too much so that I would not demand to be his only one. I’m satisfied to be one of his women...But now this happened...”

Martha collapsed onto the table and gave a loud cry.

Some days earlier, her husband had a conflict and an intense firefight with another local drug gang. Three men were killed at Frank’s gunpoint. Frank came home with their(and maybe his own) blood all over the body, picked up some baggage and went in hiding. Then today, Martha was taken to the police station and was told Frank’s arrest. Of course, she knew everything from beginning to end, only to the ignorance of Frank himself.

Also to the ignorance of this inexperienced young officer.

She’s been so long and so good at playing innocent.

Half an hour later, she walked out of the police station, the coastline was several blocks away. The night breeze was wet and gentle and warm. She pulled from her shoulders the comforting blanket the young officer nicely put on her, and tossed it to some homeless guy on the street. There’s an account at Bank of England with her name, Martha Louise Hudson. Frank knew nothing about it. She repeated the password inwardly, with all the tears stains on face, a small smile appeared at the corner of her mouth, a smile no-one ever saw.

 

02  
January 30, 2010

_I understand, dear, I’ve got a hip._

On that day, Mrs Hudson saw Doctor John Watson for the very first time.

At seven o’clock p.m., she opened the front door of 221 and welcomed Sherlock and his potential flatmate. It only took her one look to be aware of the significance of this new friend to Sherlock. At least it was Sherlock who liked him a lot, despite the fact that Sherlock may not realized it yet. She watched Sherlock putting away his habitual harsh words and rude manner, introducing her to the new guest with impeccable politeness, jogging upstairs with excitement, waiting on the landing for the crippled doctor to come up, and opened the door to 221B for him with extreme chivalry.

The living room with two French windows was very spacious and bright, and the kitchen was well equipped and furnished. Doctor Watson was quite glad about the house, not to Mrs Hudson’s surprise. The only problem was that Sherlock had moved all his stuff in here earlier that day, making the rooms so untidy. Mrs Hudson had complained about it but Sherlock never listened to a word about it. And now Doctor Watson just questioned it a bit and Sherlock got so nervous that he fumbled to pile up some books from the floor and stammered something about he can straighten things up a bit.

 _Interesting,_ Mrs Hudson observed from the door. Politeness first, then the nerves. Two features impossible to find in Sherlock came up one after another, only three minutes after the doctor showed up. Woman’s hunch told her that this is an unusual day in her life. Something important is happening, and her tranquil life will no longer be the same.

It’s a good thing that Sherlock had moved out from the shabby old place on Montagu Street. The boy needs to be looked after. Having him living here, she can at least have an eye on his diet and daily routine. The poor kid has been so thin lately that his cheeks are sinking in. The question is, even though Sherlock would allow her to interfere with his diet or daily things, his bad temper and mischievous behaviors are no way under her control. The blond doctor in front of her, however, who is so modest, sedate and generous, seems to possess a quality that will restrain Sherlock’s caprice and balance his character. What’s more, _they look so cute standing together in the living room,_ Mrs Hudson mused light-heartedly. As the saying goes: Strong horse with strong saddle. Her admirable house in central London deserves best-matching tenants to move in. She could even vividly picture them chatting in front of the fireplace, watching telly on the couch, and having breakfast by the desk, as though they have already been living here in 221B for a long time.

Mrs Hudson decided to do her best to help Sherlock to have the handsome doctor stay. She could not stand being always overshadowed by Mrs Turner next door, anyway!

Sherlock was acting so careless and impatient again and dashing out once there’s a new case, leaving the good doctor behind. The doctor looked at her with a little awkwardness and sit in the armchair to read the newspaper. Mrs Hudson was on her way downstairs to make him a cuppa when her long-time-troublesome hip felt a sting and she stumbled and almost fell.

“Mrs Hudson!” The doctor exclaimed in alarm, coming to her immediately, “What’s wrong?”

“Just my hip,” She struggled her way to stand up, “It’s OK, an old-time weakness, turns to haunt up from time to time.” She tried to sound nothing big, yet that sting made tears out of her eyes.

John went into the doctor’s mode instantly. He turned around and put Mrs Hudson into the chair, and asked thoroughly about the spot and type and history of the pain. She told him that it resulted from some youth-time work practice and had never been cured.

“What did you do for a living when you were younger, a gymnastics athlete?” The doctor said curiously, “You have a good rest over there, I will make the tea, as long as you tell me where to find the tea-leaves and cups.” And he picked up his walking stick and limped into the kitchen.

“Thank you, dear.” Mrs Hudson said to his back, very touched. She wiped her wet eyes, tuned her tone to a more sentimental scale, making sure the volume just audible to John, ands said like murmuring to herself, “It would be so much better to have a doctor at home in here...”

 

03  
December 31, 2010

_You left it in the pocket of your second best dressing gown, you clot.  
I managed to sneak it out when they thought I was having a cry. _

Sherlock is really really such a worrisome kid.

He has been bothered by the matters about that woman who left very indecent text alert noise in his phone for a week. Mrs Hudson is so irritated by this. She tried to talk into him this morning not to sulk all the time and giving John a cold shoulder. She suggested him to go out this evening for a nice dinner with John and to go to the riverside to see the New Year’s Fireworks Show. After all, John’s still a little depressed after being dumped on Christmas day, and that’s when and why Sherlock should step up and spend a nice new year’s eve with him. Sherlock had played his violin ceaselessly with his back to her, ignoring both her words and her freshly-baked Cornish Pasty.

John was also annoyed by Sherlock’s bipolar disorder. He tried to talk to him but in vain. He ended up pissed off and going out. Mrs Hudson stayed at 221A and peeped through the door from her kitchen: one minute, two minutes and five minutes later, she saw Sherlock stormed downstairs and followed out.

 _God bless him for knowing how to run after him,_ Mrs Hudson thought, feeling relieved.

She did not anticipate the bunch of American agents coming at her door because of that evil woman’s phone. Mrs Hudson knew for sure that it was Sherlock they are coming after, it was not some substantial threat to her. However it really hurted when that big-guy-in-charge’s ring had scraped her face. She whimpered and trembled, repeating _Oh please please let me go, I am just a landlady not his housekeeper, I have no idea where he put his stuff._

When they pushed her to the carpet, she fell onto the burgundy dressing gown Sherlock had thrown on the floor before he left. _Ah, there it is,_ she could feel it, that phone, in the dressing gown pocket, pressing into her hip. _Oh Sherlock,_ she sighed inwardly, must have been so restless to see John going out that he changed clothes in a hurry and followed him out, and forgetting about such an important thing.

Although she did not approve anything such as this phone at all, she was pretty sure that it would be a bad thing if the Americans had it. Mrs Hudson stealthy removed the phone from the dressing gown pocket and placed it into her corset, while making a very convincing whimpering sound.

Later that day, John cleaned her wounds. Fortunately those were minor bleedings and nothing serious. Sherlock saw off Lestrade, who came to take away the very smashed intruder, shuffled very casually into her kitchen and went directly to her fridge. _Now you are hungry,_ Mrs Hudson cracked into laughter seeing him devouring an egg tart. One detective who saved her and revenged for her, and one doctor who healed her wounds and soothed her anxiety—they are like the two wings of an angel and protect her. Mrs Hudson found it quite worthy to bleed a little, since this whole accident had reconciled the boys and everything was on good terms as before.

She’d never dreamt that in the boys’ point of view, Mrs Hudson is where Home is. Without her, England would fall.

 

04  
June 21, 2011

_It’s OK, John, there is nothing unusual in that. That’s the way he made everyone feel.  
All the marks on my table and the noise, firing guns at half past one in the morning, bloody specimens in my fridge, and the fighting! Drove me up the wall with all his carrying-on. _

_This is too hard,_ Mrs Hudson thought sadly. Looking at John tormenting himself, yet she could not speak of anything about the truth.

Surely it was a lot harder for John. He did not speak much, either. In fact, he had barely talked in days. He sat in front of the fireplace, bare-foot, silent, immobile, refusing to eat. Mrs Hudson had wanted to talk to him, but she did not know where to start. She wanted to comfort him, but every attempt seemed so vacant and pointless. Now she’s quite a little angry about Sherlock, who had gone on his own and left this tough task to her. Of course, Sherlock did all this for a reason, a reason he did not explain in detail to her—

\--For the sake and consideration of all of you, especially John’s. He cannot know, especially him, please, Mrs Hudson. I will be back as soon as the things are settled, and then everyone of us would be very happy again.

\--How long is that gonna be, Sherlock?

\--Can’t be sure. At least one week, maybe two or three months.

Mrs Hudson had nodded heavy-heartedly, she had not asked more questions. So she did not know much about Sherlock’s plan. Sherlock also agreed that the less she knew, the better. But of course Sherlock should know how desperate this would make John, and in what a difficult position would that put her, shouldn’t he?

One night she was waken up by a twinge in her hips, and heard a vague noise upstairs. Was it Sherlock? Had he already solved the problems and came back? She moved upstairs on her tiptoes. It was all dark on the second floor, and the door to Sherlock’s bedroom was half open, from where came the light noises. She went across the corridor and stopped at the door. In the pale moonlight, she saw John sitting on the floor by the end of the bed, his head burying in his knees, quivering soundlessly. He was clearly crying. Mrs Hudson could not see his face, but she would never mistaken that it was Sherlock’s navy blue dressing gown John’s grabbing.

She watched this in silence for several long minutes and decided to say nothing and do nothing. John never raised his head until she retreated slowly and went back downstairs. She knew that he knew she was there; and he knew that she knew it. However, neither of them mentioned this the other day. Or any day that followed.

Mrs Hudson had imagined it would be difficult to pretend not to know Sherlock’s alive in front of John. Nevertheless, as long as she saw John, his eyes, the corner of his mouth, the way he walked, the way he kept wordless, his mourning is devastatingly contagious.

She accompanied John to Sherlock’s tomb. Being afraid of letting the truth slip out or that John gets too sad, she cried and told him how mad and crazy Sherlock used to drive her. She kept complaining about those nerve-wracking defects and misdeeds of Sherlock’s, which were mostly true. She did not know what exactly made her tears drop, obviously it’s not because Sherlock’s dead; however, amongst all her faking-tears experience for various reasons, this time is the closest one to true tears.

 

05  
Spring, 2015

_They don’t matter, you do!_  
_Would you just see him, please, John?_  
_Do you promise?_

_Things should not be like this,_ Mrs Hudson was so worried that she had not slept well in several nights in a row, and there were blisters in her mouth.

What worried her most was not Sherlock’s physical and mental condition—although that was quite worrying—what’s even worse, is that John is _not there_. No, that is wrong, totally and completely wrong: _How_ could he not be there, when Sherlock is in hell? After all this, after Sherlock’s more-than-two-years fake death and John’s less-than-one-year marriage, how could they not cherish what they have in the present?

They are like two kids in quarrel, giving each other a hard time and not realizing how childish they are. It’s as clear as daylight that they care about each other that anyone in London could tell, but they themselves just refuse to face their heart and admit it.

What the hell are they pulling at?

She could not stand this. On this matter, nobody in the world is more responsible for doing something, more capable of doing something, and more qualified to do something than her, _Martha-Widow of a Drug Dealer-Owner of Property in Central London-Aston Martin Speed Record Holder-Hudson._ She’s not their housekeeper, it’s always been true because they are like sons to her. Now things went terribly wrong, but she will make them right. No no no, it’s not meddling; it’s leading things back to the normal orbit.

There’s no unfair means under such special circumstance. No-one knows better about those two than she does. It should be playing extra-hard on Sherlock, and extra-soft on John. To handle Sherlock, she’ll need the gun, the handcuff and the boot. When it comes to John, on the other hand, what works most is hugging, whining, and pleading. The tears, naturally, is the last straw.

So it is a bright and lovely day in the spring and it’s on a suburban street, she leaned up against her red shiny car roof and faked crying. She knew it, from the moment she stepped out of the car, John’s eyes never left that charming baby. Even before she started talking, John’s appetite is fully open. He just can’t resist this kind of dramatic stimulus: hovering helicopter, racing cars, and flaunting in front of a police officer. _That’s very good._ John is interested, it means that she’s twenty to thirty percent successful. Then she came into the house, said those persuasive words both sentimentally and rationally, and was glad to see that the doctor, pushed by his sense of responsibility and empathy, is already half-way in consenting. He would not admit it orally, but it’s all written on his facial expressions. Sherlock’s right about this: John can never conceal anything with his face. And then she made the tear thing, they would be seventy or eighty percent through their way. Great, John said _promise_ , Mrs Hudson heard that. She wiped her tears, and one more step to go before getting one hundred percent done—she only had to open the boot. Once John saw Sherlock with his own eyes (plus, in a very sexy car she knew John would long for), there would be no way that John could ever say no.

Two days afterwards, Sherlock insisted on leaving the hospital and came home. He still walks unsteadily, the wounds on his face are still healing, but he’s no longer as decadent as a few weeks ago. His eyes are bright again and the cool rationality has come back to him.

Mrs Hudson is much more reassured now. Things are still not what they should be, but they are finally on the right direction, at least.

That afternoon she came back from the grocery store, running into John and Sherlock in the hallway. They are going out, and Sherlock is wearing his ridiculous hat. The instant she sees them, she feels that something has delicately changed between them. The good kind of change, surely.

She declines their invitation to go to the cake place in excuse of tooth-aching. When Sherlock goes to the side pavement to hail a taxi, John hugs her covertly, before giving her a look that could only be interpreted as gratitude.

Five minutes later, Mrs Hudson finishes putting the food in the fridge. Her phone beeps and one text message comes in.

“Thanks. -SH”

 

+1  
January 29, 2017

_By the power vested in me by God and by the law of the United Kingdom, I now pronounce you husband and husband._

\--Mrs Hudson, do we have the honour of having you to officiate at the wedding for us?

\--Oh my god, that would be my greatest honour, boys! From the first time I saw you two standing in my living room, I know that you belong to each other and mean to be together. It took longer than I have expected, to be honest, but still, I’m so happy for you!

\--Thank you.

\--What’s the date?

\--January 29th, four weeks from today.

\--Perfect. Just in time to start a diet.

The scenes at the wedding are blurry to Mrs Hudson. It’s not some kind of figure of speech. She actually cries all the way and has misty eyes. She remembers though that the sunshine is cutting through the cold winter air, reflected by the golden glasses of champagne, knocking together to make mirthful crisp sounds. The flowers are beautiful, the music is melodious, there are people smiling, fingers entwined, rings exchanged... Everything she sees is strangely amplified and exaggerated by the tears in her eyes, and it looks like a big bubble with fairytale magic.

Though she is very certain all is real, because her tears have never been so straight form heart in her life.

Two men in exact same dress suits hug her at the same time, encircling their petite ceremony host, housekeeper and family member. Mrs Hudson closed her eyes, letting joyful tears flowing down her cheeks. Who cares if her mascara is melting, now that her boys are covering her up from the crowd. She whispered into their ears:

“I’ve been expecting this day ever since six years and three hundred and sixty-four days ago. Don’t you dare not be happily together forever.”

The newly married couple smile into each other’s eyes and answer in chorus:

“We won’t.”

They won’t indeed, Mrs Hudson, they will never let you down.

 

-END-


End file.
